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KIRKUS REVIEW

A comprehensive biography
of a sculptor of stone and space.

Art critic Robert Hughes
called Isamu Noguchi (1904-1988) “the pre-eminent American sculptor…the chief
living heir, not only to his teacher [Constantin] Brancusi, but also to the
classical Japanese feeling for material and nature.” In this meticulously
researched biography, Herrera (Joan Snyder, 2005, etc.) chronicles the
long, productive career of the acclaimed 20th-century modernist. Born to an
unconventional American mother and a Japanese father, a famous poet who
neglected him, Noguchi spent his early childhood in Japan; at 13, his mother
sent him to school in America, alone. “Banished” to another culture, he claimed
throughout his life that dual identity made him feel like an outsider. As an
artist, he drew on both cultures, and his precocious talent attracted teachers
and mentors: Brancusi, for whom he worked in Paris; and Buckminster Fuller, who
taught Noguchi about “the new technology of space and structures.” Although
Noguchi began his career making busts of celebrities (Thornton Wilder, George
Gershwin, Lincoln Kirstein), he soon moved to sculpture, stage sets (he
designed for Martha Graham for decades), and public plazas and gardens (for
UNESCO, Yale’s Beinecke Library and others), earning a reputation “as a
sculptor of space.” Herrera allows colleagues and lovers to characterize Noguchi's personality. “He was elegant and flirtatious,” a close woman friend disclosed.
“He was a seducer and a charmer.” He pursued women who were usually decades
younger and dazzled by his attentions and his fame; he married one, an actress,
but that relationship ended in divorce after a few years. Short-tempered and
egotistical, he could be difficult. One colleague said he was “stubborn as a
mule” and an astute politician. “Noguchi was a genius in knowing how to use
people,” said another.

Although reticent about
putting forth her own insights about her subject’s mind and heart, Herrera
gives readers an ample, thorough analysis of his estimable art.

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